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Vaughan’s new hospital can be quickly repurposed to assist take the load off different hospitals in the course of the pandemic — the primary hospital within the province to be devoted to COVID-19.
Premier Doug Ford made the announcement at Mackenzie Well being’s Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital Jan. 18.
“Once we’re within the struggle of our lives, this unimaginable state-of-the-art hospital, it’s like reinforcements coming over the hill,” Ford stated. “It will make a large, huge distinction.”
The Vaughan hospital, the primary newly constructed hospital within the province in additional than 30 years, was anticipated to open as a state-of-the-art “sensible hospital” early this 12 months.
As a substitute, will probably be devoted to treating COVID-19 sufferers, with not less than 185 devoted COVID-19 beds, beginning Feb. 7.
Extra beds are prone to be added in levels, with neonatal intensive care and psychological well being items presumably repurposed to satisfy the wants throughout the system.
The province faces a severe capability problem with ICU occupancy anticipated to be as excessive as 1,000 beds by early February, and sufferers being transferred from Toronto to Kingston and Niagara, Well being Minister Christine Elliott stated.
“This isn’t one thing that may proceed for a protracted time period,” she stated.
The province introduced $125 million in funding so as to add greater than 500 important care and high-intensity medication beds to hospitals in COVID-19 scorching spots in Toronto, Windsor, Durham, Kingston and Ottawa.
The hospitals can be chosen based mostly on their bodily capability so as to add beds and availability of health-care staff.
As a part of this information, Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital can be quickly transitioned right into a system-wide useful resource with 35 important care beds and 150 for normal medication to assist noncritical sufferers from different hospitals.
Operations at Mackenzie Richmond Hill Hospital will proceed whereas the Vaughan web site quickly focuses on supporting the province’s short-term pandemic response, Ford stated.
The emergency division at Mackenzie Richmond Hill Hospital will stay open to serve the group.
The emergency division at Cortellucci Vaughan — which has the power to create 25 extra COVID-19 areas — won’t open till the system has stabilized, Altaf Stationwala, Mackenzie Well being’s president and CEO, stated.
“We proceed to search for staffing; we proceed to recruit,” he stated. “I’ve by no means in my total profession as a well being care chief seen a system come collectively because it has within the final variety of months.”
Mackenzie Well being has despatched virtually 70 sufferers to different hospitals which have room — primarily Royal Victoria in Barrie, however as distant as Burlington, Stationwala stated.
Focusing Cortellucci Vaughan on COVID care will scale back the necessity for sufferers and households to be displaced so removed from their houses, he stated.
“They’re nonetheless going to have to maneuver however they will transfer to a tremendous facility that is accessible on Freeway 400 to 3 areas: Peel, York and Toronto.”
Elliott stated the state of affairs is altering rapidly and requires all arms on deck.
“There’s quite a lot of shifting and motion that should occur in addition to coping with the entire human assets, which is one other certainly one of our largest impediments, in order that’s why we’re taking a look at redeploying skilled workers from different hospitals and non-COVID associated areas into the new spots.”
“It is a completely different opening than we dedicated to our workers, physicians and group,” Stationwala stated. “We all know it’s the fitting factor to do for our group and our province.”
Situated near York Area’s border with Peel, at Jane Avenue and Main Mackenzie Drive, the hospital is centred in one of many nation’s worst-hit areas for the coronavirus.
Peel Area has lengthy been Canada’s scorching spot, and York Area has been second worst when it comes to per capita case counts.
Components of the area — Vaughan specifically — have exceeded Peel’s numbers, in response to Dr. Karim Kurji, the area’s medical officer of well being.
For that purpose, and since the overwhelming majority of rooms on the Vaughan hospital are particular person rooms, the situation is sensible for some — however not everyone seems to be on board.
Well being care staff who had been employed by Mackenzie Well being’s hospital in Richmond Hill in the course of the SARS pandemic say they continue to be traumatized by that have.
Then often known as York Central, the hospital was one of many international epicentres for the 2003 pandemic.
“Nobody needs to go (to the Vaughan hospital),” stated one nurse, who requested to not be named. “I don’t ever wish to undergo something like that once more. I’ll give up first. I simply can’t do it.”
Others query whether or not the area can afford to lose a much-anticipated well being care facility in an space that has been underserved for years.
“Mackenzie Well being is already Ontario’s most overcrowded hospital,” Richmond Hill resident and lawyer Jason Cherniak stated. “We want that new emergency division in Vaughan and I discover it exhausting to imagine that the best choice for the province is to maintain it closed. Is that this the most effective resolution, or the simplest?”
However Stationwala and Vaughan Mayor Maurizio Bevilaqua harassed this can be a vital however short-term measure.
As soon as COVID-19 capability pressures have stabilized, the brand new hospital will present care and providers to sufferers from throughout western York Area as initially deliberate.
“After this short-term disaster is over, we are going to present all of the providers that had been promised to the individuals of Vaughan and past,” Bevilaqua stated.
“We have now to pool our useful resource collectively. No matter you might have, it’s important to placed on the desk. On the finish of the day, as Ontarians, we share the dangers and advantages of our widespread citizenship and we must be there for one another.”
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